Do you ever feel ‘lost’ in your parenting?  Like you’ve read all the books (and even listened to the podcast episodes!) and you’ve agreed with them in principle, but somehow nothing ever seems to change?

Your family feels directionless; you just muddle along having the same old fights with your partner about the same old things:


Should you praise your child when they do what you ask, so they’ll do it again next time? Or punish them for disobeying you?

Should you worry about (quality or quantity of) screen time?

Does it matter if you and your partner have completely different parenting styles?


In this episode I interviewed Kathryn, and discussed:


The cultural differences between living in the U.K. and Canada (saying “please!” and certain differences in directness of humor)

How to begin to approach differences in opinion about parenting with your spouse in a way that doesn’t get their back up, but instead focuses on your (and their) values

The value of interacting with parents who are a little ahead of you and who can give you advice, as well as parents with younger children so you can see how far you’ve come and offer some support to them

How to align your daily interactions with your child with your overall values

The importance of bringing fun and playfulness to your parenting in a way that feels relaxed to you (and the positive impact this can have on your child)

How to problem solve with a child in a way that encourages them to bring their own solutions to the table


If you’re interested in learning more about the Finding Your Parenting Mojo membership, you can find all the info on it at https://yourparentingmojo.com/membership/ (yourparentingmojo.com/membership) – and also sign up for the FREE Top 5 Strategies to Tame Your Triggers webinar (scheduled for Wednesday September 30th at 11am PT) there as well.

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Jen:                                      01:25 Hello and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. We're doing something a little bit different on today's episode because I'm actually going to interview a listener, Kathryn. Kathryn is a Canadian living in London and she's married to an English husband and she has a daughter and a son. I connected with Kathryn to talk about the transformation that she's experienced in her parenting over the last 6 months or so. Kathryn's family was doing pretty well, although she was having some challenges knowing how to parent her spirited daughter and having a very different approach to doing this than her British husband who was raised with much more of a traditional British approach of not talking about feelings very much, which really contrasted pretty sharply with Kathryn's belief that the experience and the emotions should be validated and supported. These different approaches were causing some friction in her marriage and she felt like she didn't really have the tools to articulate why this issue and others like it were so important to her in a way that could invite her husband to share his perspective and feelings so they could work together to find a path forward in parenting their children.

Jen:                                      02:25 Now, both Kathryn and her husband feel more at ease in their family because they know the decisions they're making are based on their values and not just on knee jerk reactions made in the moment when their daughter asked to do something and they might be feeling a bit stressed and as a result they've really become to embrace the joyful aspects of parenting as you'll hear in the conversation. Before we talked with Kathryn, I do have a question for you and that is, are you truly enjoying your family right now? Yes, families have their ups and downs and not every day is perfect and neither will it be, but more often than not, do you feel confident about how the little decisions you make every day as a parent